I just wanted to add that I just went on the Oprah website (Oprah.com) and Thursday's show is called "Inside Fascinating Lives". There's a segment on a woman on the new show "Secret Millionaires", a segment about a model with a secret and then the website says "plus a real life 'black swan' confesses". (whatever that means).

New York City Ballet Principal Dancer Jenifer Ringer will make a special appearance on the Oprah Winfrey Show on Thursday, February 17 as part of an episode exploring fascinating lives.

In addition to being interviewed by Ms. Winfrey in front of her studio audience, the segment will also include rare behind-the-scenes footage of Ms. Ringer shot on location with the New York City Ballet, featuring company class, rehearsals, and a performance of Jerome Robbins’ I’m Old Fashioned.

Ms. Ringer trained at the School of American Ballet (the official school of NYCB), and joined New York City Ballet when she was just 16 years old. She was promoted to soloist in 1995, and has been a principal dancer since 2000. During her career with NYCB Ms Ringer has danced numerous leading roles in the Balanchine and Robbins repertory, and has also originated leading roles in ballets by Peter Martins, Christopher Wheeldon, Twyla Tharp, and Alexei Ratmansky, among others.

In New York City the Oprah Winfrey Show airs at 4 p.m. on WABC-TV Channel 7, for broadcast schedule in other areas, please check local listings.

I yearn for the old days of Oprah, where she would interview one subject for the full 45 minutes of the show. Now she shows 13 subjects, providing mere voiceovers and "MC"ing the event with a live studio audience. Jenifer Ringer is a fascinating subject for a full show. Just my two cents on the matter.

It was an interesting, if too brief interview. Jenifer Ringer was charming and articulate. The thrust of the interview was, "are ballerinas by definition loony as shown in the Black Swan film?" While admitting that the work is demanding, and there is naturally some competition Ms Ringer herself was proof that you don't have to be psycho to be an artist. In addition to clips of her making up and performing, there was one of her at home with her (adorable) daughter.
Oprah brought up the reference to her weight in the Times review. She answered very honestly about her early issues with weight, and how she felt about the review. And BTW, she looked slender, beautiful and healthy. Brava

Dancemom, the photos are indeed lovely and I enjoyed looking at them. But I chuckled a bit by the opening statement that referred to Ringer and Millepied as "two of dance's brightest stars". Would they have been referred to that way a year ago?Before SugarPlumGate and Black Swan? Goes to lend more support to the old age "there's no such thing as bad publicity".

All in all I'm happy for Ringer, she's had a lot of ups and downs and she's a lovely dancer.I'm glad she's gotten some recognition. Millepied less so, mostly because I'm wary it will boost his work as a dance creater and certainly his choreography itself won't really do that.

One of my favorite moments isn't covered here. Oprah asked how accurately Black Swan's ultra-competitive atmosphere of the ballet world reflected real life. Jenny replied, "We don't kill each other so much. I've only killed two or three."

One of my favorite moments isn't covered here. Oprah asked how accurately Black Swan's ultra-competitive atmosphere of the ballet world reflected real life. Jenny replied, "We don't kill each other so much. I've only killed two or three."

Note to Oprah:Give Jeni her own show on your network stat!

She's one of those ballerinas that makes you feel happy whether she's dancing or just sitting there.

I thought the interview was less pointed than Ann Curry's but only slightly less. Both Ann Curry and Oprah have an agenda and rather than letting Jenifer Ringer just talk and tell us what she thinks they try to corner and coerce yes-answers to their ballet-is-oppressive questions. I thought Jenifer Ringer handled herself remarkably.

Also, it was great to see that behind the scenes footage in glorious HD on a big screen TV instead of the tiny computer screen Youtube videos I normally watch.